Life is about movement. Older people must engage in appropriate mental and physical labor. Physical exercise is especially necessary. Modern medical research has confirmed that exercise can enhance oxygen uptake, promote the metabolism of tissues and cells throughout the body. At the same time, exercise is the most active measure to promote compensatory function recovery. Exercise can also improve people's mood, make them mentally invigorated and full of vitality. Exercise is an important part of elderly health care.
1. The Impact of Exercise on Muscles
As people age, muscles undergo degenerative changes, characterized by thinning muscle fibers and muscle atrophy. Muscles become less elastic, weaker, less enduring, and lose control, making it difficult for elderly people to move and maintain stability, and causing difficulties in self-care. In fact, the process of muscle aging varies from person to person, and natural aging accounts for only one-third of the causes, while the other two-thirds are due to lack of exercise.
From the perspective of exercise physiology, muscles are "use it or lose it". The more muscles are used, the more developed they become, and inactive muscles will atrophy, just like the muscle atrophy that occurs in paralyzed patients. On the other hand, people who exercise regularly have good muscle elasticity, flexibility, quick and agile movements, and good stability.
Regular physical activity can slow down muscle atrophy and degenerative changes. Constantly stretching and contracting muscles during exercise can increase muscle endurance, contraction force, explosive force, and coordination, restore elasticity, and improve skin laxity.
During exercise, the heart muscle increases endurance and contraction force, which can improve the cardiac output per minute and reduce the number of heartbeats, thus reducing the burden on the heart. Generally speaking, people who engage in regular physical exercise have developed heart muscles and strong bouncing ability.
2. The Impact of Exercise on Bones
Bone aging refers to osteoporosis, which is caused by calcium loss. Bone loss due to calcium loss can occur after puberty and is most evident between 50 and 70 years old. After calcium loss, bone flexibility decreases and brittleness increases, making it easy to cause fractures, and these fractures are the most difficult to heal, causing great pain to the elderly. Experts point out that exercise is one of the three basic measures to prevent osteoporosis.
Why can exercise prevent bone aging?
Mainly because exercise can promote blood circulation and provide sufficient nutrients to bone tissues. Exercise can also stimulate mechanical stimulation of bone tissue, promote the deposition, absorption, and storage of calcium, and promote bone growth. Therefore, regular participation in sports activities is an effective measure to prevent osteoporosis and reduce the incidence of elderly fractures.
3. The Impact of Exercise on the Circulatory System
Exercise can thicken the heart wall, increase the contractility of the heart muscle, expand coronary blood vessels, improve myocardial blood supply, thereby improving the ability of the heart to use oxygen, and also increasing the utilization rate of blood oxygen in the whole body.
Secondly, exercise can alleviate microvascular spasms, promote blood circulation, and improve the blood supply to important organs such as the brain.
Furthermore, exercise can enhance metabolism and control body weight. It can increase high-density lipoprotein in plasma, help reduce and eliminate arterial cholesterol, promote fat consumption, prevent obesity, and inhibit the deposition of lipids on the vascular wall.
People with heart disease generally have low levels of high-density lipoprotein in their blood plasma. Experts point out that exercise seems to be the best way to increase high-density lipoprotein in blood plasma. This conclusion is drawn from a survey of 4,600 men and women. Due to the impact of exercise on the cardiovascular system, long-term exercise can effectively prevent hyperlipidemia, arteriosclerosis, hypertension, coronary heart disease, stroke, and other diseases. According to a study report from Harvard University's survey of 17,000 graduates, regular and active exercise can reduce the risk of heart attacks by 35%. It can be seen that exercise has a certain therapeutic effect on hyperlipidemia, arteriosclerosis, hypertension, coronary heart disease, stroke, and other conditions.
4. The Impact of Exercise on the Respiratory System
Exercise is beneficial for enhancing the movement of the thoracic cavity, strengthening the activity of respiratory muscles, and making breathing more powerful. Increased lung elasticity allows more alveoli to fully expand, thereby enhancing lung ventilation function, and allowing ample fresh oxygen to enter the body while carbon dioxide is expelled in a timely manner. The strengthening of respiratory movements and the improvement of ventilation function ensure the oxygen supply to all parts of the body, especially improving the reduced lung capacity caused by senile emphysema. The increase in oxygen content in the blood and the sufficient supply of oxygen can make people feel energetic and improve memory.
According to relevant data, people who exercise regularly can achieve a maximum oxygen consumption of 80 milliliters per minute per kilogram of body weight. People who do not exercise, especially those who sit for long periods, have a maximum oxygen consumption of only 30 to 50 milliliters per minute per kilogram of body weight. This value is even lower for patients with coronary heart disease. Exercise increases lung ventilation and oxygen uptake, improves respiratory function, so it can prevent and treat respiratory system diseases.
5. The Impact of Exercise on the Digestive System
We know that exercise deepens and accelerates breathing, increases the activity of muscles, and causes the movement of abdominal organs, which in turn promotes the secretion of digestive juices, improves the body's digestive function, enhances appetite, promotes metabolism, facilitates the digestion and absorption of nutrients, and strengthens the physique. The increased activity of abdominal and diaphragmatic muscles can also act as an automatic massage for the digestive organs, accelerate the peristalsis of the stomach and intestines, improve blood circulation, and thus promote digestive function and prevent constipation.
Exercise helps prevent and treat common digestive system diseases in the elderly, such as ulcers, gastric prolapse, gastrointestinal neurosis, constipation, and poor digestion.
6. The Impact of Exercise on the Brain
Active participation in sports can improve intelligence and bring unexpected benefits. The reason is as follows:
1. Exercise accelerates blood circulation, improves cardiopulmonary function, and timely supplies nutrients and oxygen to the brain. According to the research and measurement of medical physiologists, blood circulation occurs 4 to 5 times per minute during rest and can reach up to 7 times during exercise. Therefore, after exercising for a while, you will feel clear-minded, clear thinking, and quick-witted.
2. People who regularly participate in sports have more stored energy substances such as blood sugar, liver glycogen, and muscle creatine than the general population. Therefore, when using the brain, their brain function will not decrease due to low blood sugar, and their physical strength will not be exhausted due to reduced muscle glycogen. People who regularly participate in sports also have more "myoglobin" stored in their muscles, which stores more oxygen. Adequate oxygen supply can timely remove metabolic waste, such as lactic acid and carbon dioxide, from labor and brain activities, without causing fatigue.
3. Exercise not only activates the excitatory center of the cerebral cortex but also improves the regulatory function of the brain, increases the activity intensity, reaction speed, flexibility, and accuracy of brain cells, strengthens the nervous system's tolerance to fatigue. At the same time, scientists have also found that exercise can increase the weight of the cerebellum and the thickness of the cortex, which helps to discover the intellectual potential of the contralateral brain.
Why do athletes often have more coordinated and agile movements and faster reflexes? To be precise, this is the result of the frequent training of their nervous system. Scientists have also found that during exercise, the brain releases special chemicals such as endorphins due to mental excitement and a relaxed mood, which has a good effect on the development of memory and intelligence. Some scholars in China have also conducted experiments. Short bursts of exercise during work breaks can increase visual and auditory acuity by 30% for tired individuals.
7. The Impact of Exercise on the Immune System
Exercise, especially running, can improve the body's anti-cancer ability. From a physiological perspective:
1. Running can accelerate blood circulation, increase the number of white blood cells in the blood, and neutrophils among them have the ability to phagocytose bacteria. It has been measured that running for 10 to 15 minutes by middle-aged and elderly people can increase the number of white blood cells in the blood circulation by 50%. 2. Running promotes strong metabolism in the body and can prevent the malignant transformation of aging cells. During running, substances such as lead and cadmium in the body are also excreted with sweat, which has an anti-cancer effect.
3. Running can increase lung capacity, allowing people to inhale more oxygen than usual. Research has found that increased oxygen intake can prevent tumors because tumor cells are anaerobic. Even if cancer occurs, increased oxygen can play a therapeutic role and prolong life.
4. Regular running, due to enhanced substance metabolism, promotes appetite, improves digestive system function, and enables the body to fully absorb and utilize necessary nutrients. With a strong material foundation, the body can enhance its anti-cancer ability.
5. Running can regulate the activity of the nervous system, make people feel refreshed, cheerful, and optimistic. Clinical observations have found that many cancer patients develop the disease due to emotional depression or mental trauma.
